gentrification

III. GENTRIFICATION DYNAMICS:DEFINITION, SCALE, CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCESThe term “gentrification” is both imprecise and quite politically charged. In both thesubstantial academic literature on the subject and in the popular discourse, gentrification has had anumber of contrasting definitions. 3 Some studies frame gentrification within the decades-longprocess of disinvestment and re-investment in a particular neighborhood, suggesting that publicpolicies and the owners of capital conspire, and enable higher income people to reap substantialprofits from gentrification. 4 Others use the term interchangeably with urban revitalization, to describeany commercial or residential improvements in urban neighborhoods. Others consider gentrificationto more narrowly refer to the physical upgrading of low-income neighborhoods. Others havefocused primarily on the economic actions of newcomers, namely the renovation and upgrading ofthe housing stock. In contrast to these property-focused visions of the gentrification process, othersdescribe gentrification as the class and racial tensions and dislocation—the socioeconomic orpeople-based effects—that frequently accompany the arrival of new residents into a neighborhood.With so many notions of the term, it is important to specify the definition we apply togentrification. In this paper we define gentrification as the process by which higher incomehouseholds displace lower income residents of a neighborhood, changing the essential characterand flavor of that neighborhood. Often, though not always, gentrification has a very clear racialcomponent, as higher income white households replace lower income minority households,sometimes in the very same neighborhoods that experienced “white flight” and traumatic urbanrenewal in the ‘50s and ‘60s. 5It is worth noting three key features of our definition. First, gentrification requires thedisplacement of lower income residents from their neighborhoods. We are most concerned aboutinvoluntary displacement, that is, the displacement of those “original” residents who would prefer tostay in their neighborhood, but because of non-just-cause evictions, rapidly rising rents or increasesin their property tax bills, cannot afford to do so. In addition to families that are directly displacedfrom changes in their neighborhood, researchers identify a form of exclusionary displacement, wherechanges in the neighborhood prevent future lower income households from moving in. 6 Second,gentrification has a physical as well as socioeconomic component that results in the upgrading ofhousing stock in the neighborhood. Third, gentrification results in the changed character of theneighborhood. This is a much more subjective feature of the definition, but one that is critical.Gentrification is not only attracting higher income households who replace lower income households3 For a good discussion of historical definitions, see Bruce London and J. John Palen, Gentrification,Displacement and Neighborhood Revitalization. Albany: State University of New York, 1984, pp. 6-10.4 Smith, Neil, The New Urban Frontier: Gentrification and the Revanchist City. London and New York:Routledge, 1996.5 As noted above, all of our cases included significant instances in which incoming households were non-white.Atlanta, Washington and Cleveland all have sizeable numbers of African American newcomers, while theAfrican American community of Bayview/Hunters Point in the Bay Area is seeing an influx of Asian Americanhouseholds.6 Marcuse, Peter, “Gentrification, Abandonment, and Displacement: Connections, Causes, and PolicyResponses,” Journal of Urban and Contemporary Law, Vol. 28, pp. 206-207.5